


Of Mushrooms and Magma

by 27dragons, tisfan



Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magic, Drow, Howard Stark's Bad Parenting, M/M, Mage!Tony Stark, Mages, Minor Injuries, Protective Bucky Barnes, The Underdark (Forgotten Realms), genre appropriate racial tensions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-28
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:15:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26166247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/27dragons/pseuds/27dragons, https://archiveofourown.org/users/tisfan/pseuds/tisfan
Summary: When magical artificer Tony Stark falls down a hole and breaks his leg, he doesn't really intend to come to the attention of the dark elves who live there.But when brother and sister, Bucky and Natasha, take him in and heal his injuries, Tony has to question everything he thought he knew about the drow.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Tony Stark
Comments: 91
Kudos: 520
Collections: Fairytale Bingo, Tony Stark Flash Bingo





	1. Down in the Underground

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony Stark Flash Bingo: 020 : Dark Secret (we're stretching this prompt, but hey!)  
> Fantasy Bingo: Drow
> 
> again, this is crack. Roll with it.

Tony checked the strength of his knot -- good and solid -- and looked down into the crevice in the side of the mountain. It looked very, very deep.

Deep enough that he couldn’t see the bottom.

That was good. The specific mushrooms he was looking for would shrivel up and puff into a cloud of spores if they were so much as brushed with the light of the sun. They were incredibly difficult to find, but they had a number of fascinating properties that made them ideal for artifice work.

Tony, as the kingdom’s leading creator of magical artifacts, relied on them for his most potent creations.

Unfortunately, his supplier hadn’t been seen for over a year, and Tony had been forced to go looking.

Fortunately, after a few months of travel, he’d located the man.

Unfortunately, Tony had located a memorial marker and the tale that he’d gotten into a territorial dispute with a cave troll.

Fortunately, the supplier had died with several debts unpaid, and for the price of a dozen or so gold coins, his former patron had consented to pass on the maps and notes that had been left behind. Which meant that Tony could go in search of the mushrooms himself.

Unfortunately, the best spot for the mushrooms, according to the maps, was just over the border and into drow territory. So Tony was going to have to be _extremely_ careful as he did his hunting.

He checked his knot one more time, and then gingerly lowered himself into the crevice.

It was slow going; his small lantern seemed to cast light no further than the reach of his arm, and after he’d gone down twenty feet or so, there was a wind that made him sway like a poorly balanced pendulum.

Still, the reward was worth the trouble. He kept climbing downward.

It wasn’t until he’d gone a hundred feet that the rope made a soft twang noise, and Tony realized that while his knot had been quite sound, he hadn’t thought to pad it against the edge of the crevice, where it rubbed against the rock.

One of the strands had already parted. Tony stared up at the distant, pale sliver of light, and wondered if he should try to climb back up, or continue down and hope to reach the bottom. Climbing up would put more strain on the rope, and he wasn’t at all sure he could make it. If he climbed down, he would be stranded at the bottom with no way back out.

Either way, it looked bad.

The rope twitched and twanged again. Down it was, then. One way or another.

Tony began to shimmy down the rope as quickly as he could manage, all but sliding down its length. The quality of sound changed somewhat -- the echo of his breathing sounded different, and he hoped that meant he was nearing the bottom. He risked a glance down, but couldn’t see anything.

And then the rope snapped and went slack, and Tony fell.

* * *

Bucky checked his moonstone again, the very dim glow was almost full, which meant it was nighttime, topside. That was always best; venturing out of the caves was always dangerous, but more so in the sunlight. So long underground and his people could barely see on the surface, the sun was, if not quite deadly, at least very uncomfortable against skin unused to it. 

The surface world was noisy and terrifying and full of people who bore no love for drow or dwarf, troll or trog. Surface dwellers could be very hostile. But they couldn’t see well without lanterns, and tended to sleep at night, which made it the very best time for short excursions above ground. The crevice that led upward wasn’t too hard to climb, if you knew where all the handholds were.

Bucky pulled on his cloak, belted it. The surface world tended to be windy, cold. Sometimes. He wasn’t sure what the season was, above. Below ground was always the same.

He turned the last corner and--

There was someone laying on the ground, a long slither of rope next to them like a dead snake.

Bucky melded back into the shadows, in case he’d been seen.

But there was only a soft, pained groan.

It wasn’t drow. Didn’t even smell like an elf. Bucky let himself drift a little closer, remaining in the darkest of the shadows where he couldn’t be seen.

The person -- whatever it was -- groaned again, and an arm moved, feeling around itself, on the floor of the cavern, then over its own body. There was a sharp hiss of pain, and the person moved again, pushing up onto one arm as it tested its leg.

“Broken,” it said, in the language of humans. It tipped its head back to look up at the top of the crevice, and then sighed. “Damn.”

Bucky fumbled in his cloak for his nightblade, made from blackened steel so it didn’t reflect even the tiniest gleam of light. He took several more steps closer. Obviously, he couldn’t leave a feral human wandering around in the caverns. He licked his lips, then, “what are you doing down here?” The human words felt strange in his mouth, all harsh and too full of choppy syllables.

The human -- he assumed -- went still. It twisted around, trying to see him, but apparently didn’t. “I fell,” it said after a moment. “I was looking for mushrooms.” It hesitated, then said, “Are you going to kill me?”

“Do you need to be killed?” Like an animal in too much pain to survive? Bucky crept a little closer, trying to discern features. Rather a lot of dark, messy hair, and some on its face, too. Too tall to be a dwarf. Must be human. Probably a male. Bucky thought only male humans had beards.

“If I’m being honest, I’d rather not. But I broke my leg in the fall -- I should be grateful I didn’t split my skull open, really -- and I’m not sure I can leave. So if I’m trespassing or something, I’m very sorry, but I can’t do much to fix the situation right now.”

“What kind of mushroom?” Bucky wondered. He let himself actually come out of the shadow, close enough to the human to touch. He’d never actually seen a human before, just heard stories of them. They really weren’t so monstrous. The human’s teeth seemed normal enough, not sharp and pointy. His ears were rounded at the top, which looked strange. Exotic, really. Bucky’s fingers darted out, not quite daring. He’d heard that a human’s skin could burn a drow to cinders, but he couldn’t feel any unusual heat radiating off the man. Maybe he had poison skin, like one of the dart frogs.

“Oh!” It wasn’t until Bucky had nearly touched him that the man actually spotted Bucky. “Shit, where did you come from?” He pressed his hand to his chest. His breathing seemed a little fast. Maybe because he was in pain. Or maybe humans just breathed like that all the time. “I, uh. We call them deepshrooms. Sort of... purple, with white spots on the cap that glow just a little bit?”

“Brightcaps,” Bucky said. The phosphorescent mushrooms were quite useful. He supposed there were some growing wild in this part of the cavern-system, but quite a few more back home. They were grown in large fields by some of the wealthier farmers. “Yes, we know them. You want them, and then you will leave again? Or are you too hurt to climb?”

The man looked at him, considering. “I would like to leave again,” he said carefully. “But I can’t climb -- my leg is broken. With a splint of some sort, I could walk. A little.” He looked around, as if trying to find some other way to move himself, but shook his head. “Maybe I can figure something out. If I had a couple of deep-- brightcaps, I might be able to make the rope into a good binding. And then...” He patted at his pockets. “I’m sure I’ve got something useful in here.”

Bucky sat back on his heels, pondering his obligations. First, he absolutely needed to get topside, do his harvesting and hunting to keep his family fed. He could not leave a wild human loose in the caverns. Not being able to walk, the creature might still be able to drag itself closer to the clusters of drow who lived there. It might hurt someone. And chances were very good, someone would hurt it. They would kill it and then live in fear for many months, waiting to see if the humans would retaliate. Families would be angry, and if anyone learned that Bucky could have prevented that-- well.

Bucky heaved a sigh. It shouldn’t be Bucky’s decision to decide this human’s fate. But the Gods had dropped the human right in Bucky’s path. No one went down this way, except him, and sometimes his sister. It was one of the old ways. “Right, then,” he said. “We will make a deal then, you and I. You are hurt, and if you do as I say, I will bring you to my sister who can see to the healing of your hurt. If I do this, you will not yell and scream and fuss and set up a bad echo in the caverns for weeks and weeks. You will be calm and quiet and you will not try to harm anyone.”

The human looked at him again, frowning slightly. “I have a broken leg,” he pointed out. “There’s a point at which stoically enduring pain is impossible, and I’m probably going to reach that point if it gets poked at or dragged the wrong way or... something. But I have no intention of hurting anyone, really. Can your sister really heal me? I can pay, maybe.”

Bucky didn't want to make promises he could not keep. "She will decide. It is her home, I am just her brother. Do you have food? I was going topside to hunt. If you do not, you will have to wait until I get back, and then I will have to haul you and the kill."

The human was shivering. Either from pain or cold. Bucky took off his coat. The human could wrap it around himself to keep warm. "Here." 

The human flinched a little, and then stared up at Bucky. “Oh. You-- Thank you? I, I have a little food, but not much. I wasn’t expecting to be here for very long. But I can-- oh, wait, I think...” He opened one of several pouches he had and pulled out a ring. It was remarkably ugly, a bright, gaudy gem set in gold, but it reeked of magic. “You can use this. It will make you stronger while you wear it. Easier to carry things. Like deer. And injured humans.”

“All right,” Bucky said. He tucked the coat around the injured human like he was a child. Handed him one of Bucky’s spare waterskins. “Stay here-- do not move much. I will be back for you.” He patted the human’s shoulder through his coat, still not knowing if the human’s touch would be poisonous, but not wanting to leave without some gesture of good faith. He took a few steps and started climbing up the wall toward the exit.

“You’re going to just _climb?_ ” the human said, sounding utterly nonplussed. “All the way up?”

“You have eyes, do you not?” Bucky called back. Once he found the first set of marked handholds, it was an easy enough climb. “Watch me.”

“It’s got to be at least five hundred feet,” the human protested weakly.

Bucky waved, because he was a cheeky bastard sometimes, and continued climbing. He’d made longer climbs, although admittedly, the deeps were marked with actual ladders and resting platforms.

* * *

_Watch me,_ the drow said, as if Tony could see more than shadows in this cavern. He managed to follow the shape of the drow partway up the wall, maybe thirty feet or so, before everything became blackness.

He wrapped the drow’s cloak more closely around himself -- that had been a surprise, but he wasn’t going to protest it. The cloak was tightly-woven and soft and warm, and it was cold down here. Tony tried to pull his leg into a somewhat more comfortable position, but the spike of pain convinced him quickly to leave it be. Instead, he laid back, letting the cloak serve as a blanket, and dozed off.

When he opened his eyes, he wasn’t in the cavern anymore.

Or maybe he was, and this was a fever-dream. It was still dark, but not nearly the all-consuming black of the cavern. But he could see, a little, like waking in the night and making his way through the room by a sliver of moonlight.

He was lying on something soft and warm, definitely not a rocky floor, and seemed to be in a small room. The drow’s cloak was gone, but there was a blanket over him of the same soft cloth.

He appeared to be alone, and his leg was throbbing in pain. He debated the options for a while and finally decided on, “Hello?”

The woman who came into the room was not the drow he’d seen earlier, and she was carrying something small that glowed. She sat it down near him. “This is a lantern,” she said, twisting it. Two interlocked clay pots with holes, and as she turned it, it gave off more, or less light. It still wasn’t what Tony would consider bright, not even as much as a single candle. “You may adjust it to what is most comfortable for you.” She sat down on a cushioned stool near his bed. 

“Thank you?” He left it where she’d set it, but he did pick it up to look at how it was put together. Clever thing, really. “Um, sorry, who are you?”

“Natasha, of the Black Widow clan,” she said. “My brother brought you home like a stray bat and says ‘can we keep it?’ Who are you?”

“Tony. Tony Stark. I’m an artificer. It’s... good to meet you? You live here? What about the drow?”

Natasha looked at him for a long moment. “Do you need more light, then? You cannot see me?”

“I can see you,” Tony said. He had no idea what that had to do with his question.

“Then it is a silly question,” she said. “What about the drow… _indeed_.”

Tony blinked. “Do you mean you’re a _drow_?” She looked _nothing_ like a drow, pale skin and bright red hair.

“I did say we were the Black Widow clan, yes?” She pulled back her hair a little to show off a delicate, elongated ear with a sharp tip, dotted all up the lobe and shell with silver jewelry. “I am drow. You are human. You are human, yes? I confess I’ve never actually seen one before. You’re much less terrifying than we have been led to believe.”

“...Likewise.” Tony blinked up at her. “Also, much paler.”

She looked down at her own arms, turning her hands. “Did you think we would be tanned by your sun?”

“No, I mean... I thought the drow were dark-skinned. To blend in with the darkness in the caverns.”

“We wear paint, when we go above,” she said. “My brother was wearing it. So that the topside creatures don’t see us. You are all blind, but white skin against shadow is very noticeable. Of course, some of us are darker, naturally. Like humans or dwarves. We are of many sub-clans.”

“Oh.” That... made sense, didn’t it? Humans came in a dozen shades of tan and pink and brown. And the surface elves, too, had a whole rainbow of colors to them. “So the... the all-white hair, that’s not really a thing, either, huh?”

“Why would any who are not old have white hair?” She shook her head. “I think you topsiders have too much gossip and not enough fact.”

“Well, that’s probably true,” Tony admitted. “But it’s not as if any of you have turned up for an interview. So we make things up, based on, you know, glimpses and the occasional lost item. Pitch-black skin and white hair, worshipers of a spider-god, that sort of thing.”

“Oh, well, the spider gods, they’re real,” she said. “Not just one, you know, but--” She gestured. “Clan of the Black Widow. And the High Priestess, she’s a follower of the Goliath Bird Eating God.” Natasha leaned in close. “She’s a little full of herself.”

“That... sounds like a god -- and a spider -- I want to never see. Ever.” Tony felt pretty strongly about that, actually. “So that was your... brother? Who found me?”

“Yes, Bucky. I swear to you, he does this many times. He has brought home wounded rabbits, and birds with broken wings. Never a human, though. You are the first. But we will take care of you, and then you may go back to your people. When you are well enough. And then we will close the crevice. One human, not so bad. But you let many in, and they are like rats. Everywhere, eating everything.”

“Well, that’s... probably not too far off.” Tony lived as a hermit for a _reason_. “Your brother’s name is _Bucky_?”

“Yes,” Natasha said, blinking again. “Do you have problems with your ears? Short little things that they are. I knew humans were all night blind, but I thought you could hear.” She reached out as if to tug on his ear, to stretch it a little.

Tony ducked away. “I heard, I just didn’t... It just sounds so... normal.” A little silly, even, though Tony didn’t know if it would be offensive to say so.

“We are people,” Natasha said. “Not monsters in the darkness. Like you. Not so monstrous. But, satisfying my curiosity about round-ears is not what I meant to be doing. How is your leg? We set the bone, but I did not want to spellwork on you without your-- do you have a sister who would grant permission, or is it all right for you to say for yourself?”

Tony blinked. “I don’t-- I’m an only child. Sisters speak for their brothers?” That seemed an odd arrangement. What if a family had no girl children? Or many girls -- who would speak for the boys, then? And why couldn’t the boys speak for themselves?

“I don’t know your ways, forgive me,” Natasha said. “Here, women speak for the house. For the clan. By law.” She made a face and wobbled her hand a little. “It is more tradition than truth, but Bucky must ask permission. He knows I would give it. For some strange priestess to heal his wounds. If you-- if you want.”

“Huh. For us, it’s mostly the men who are in charge of the households. But yes, please, of your kindness.”

Natasha nodded. “I will do this, then,” she said. She turned the blanket down to show the splint that someone -- Bucky, probably -- had made of strips of cloth bound right with Tony’s rope. “It was a clean break. It will heal well. You will have to stay here, no more than a few weeks. My magic is not so strong.” 

She held out a hand over his leg, fingers moving in arcane motions, flicks and circles. She murmured words in a language that Tony didn’t speak, that didn’t even sound like elvish. Thick and somehow liquid at the same time.

He’d been healed before; usually it was a cool, soothing wind over his injuries that left them feeling a little tingly, but much less painful.

This was heat, instead, like hot coals had been shoved into his leg and were trying to _melt_ the bone, to fuse it back together like so much steel. Tony found himself gripping the blankets on either side of him, teeth clenched around a thin whine, eyes firm-fixed on his leg as if trying to prove to himself that it was swollen and bruised-looking but not actually blistering from the heat.

And then, as suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. Tony sagged, panting.

“There,” she said, tucking the blanket back around him again. “It will be a few days yet, until you can bear your own weight without pain. In the meanwhile, I will send Bucky to you, to keep you entertained.” She paused for a moment at the mouth to the little cave-room. “Welcome to the Underdark, Tony Stark.”


	2. You'll Find Someone True

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony's been in the Underdark for a while -- and is trying to find an excuse to stay longer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony Stark Flash Bingo: Adopted: Ivan Vanko/Whiplash  
> Fairytale Bingo: Elemental

“Tony,” Bucky said, smiling. Tony still wasn’t used to that, how _normal_ Bucky looked when he wasn’t covered in the dark purple skin-paint that the drow wore above ground. He tended to wear black clothing -- he and his sister both -- but that wasn’t that strange. The drow brother and sister were both very normal. They ate and slept. Bucky did hunting and gathering on the surface from time to time.

But Tony hadn’t seen any other drow; the Black Widow clan was small, just the two of them, and they didn’t seem to have frequent visitors.

Most of the time, though, Bucky and Natasha looked perfectly normal. Not human, but not that different from a surface elf. Tony’s eyes had adjusted, somewhat, to the dim light, and it really wasn’t very difficult from visiting elven friends.

“Bucky, hey,” Tony returned. “Good morning.”

He had no idea what time it actually was, but the drow were both amused by his time-centric greetings. 

“I brought you something,” Bucky said, shyly holding something behind his back. “From over the Mirror lake.”

The Mirror lake was a huge underground lake that bisected one of the larger caverns. More drow lived on the other side, Tony had been told. “You brought me something? What is it?”

Bucky gave him that little smile again and then placed a purple mushroom on the table, little spots glowing like stars in the darkness. “Brightcap. You said you needed them.”

“Oh!” Tony picked it up, turning it in his hands. It was a perfect specimen, larger and much fresher than any Tony had seen before. “Thank you, this is wonderful.”

“They’re kind of small,” Bucky said, and he brought the rest of the basket out. “They’re not quite in season yet. But you’re leaving us soon, and-- well, I wanted to make sure you got what you paid in so much pain for.”

Tony’s mouth fell open. The basket was nearly _full_ of deepshrooms, more than Tony had ever seen in one place. It was a small fortune in spellcasting ingredients. “Bucky,” he breathed. “Oh, gods, this is too much.”

“Do you have a special way you like to prepare them? They were a favorite when Natasha was a child, she used to pout at me until I shared my portion.”

“Prepare-- you _eat_ them?” Tony couldn’t quite resist holding the first one a little closer, protectively.

“Of course,” Bucky said. “The brightcaps are used for many things; clothing dye, food, it’s an ingredient in the wash we use to see better in the Deeps. They grow in some of the caverns, like little stars, up the walls. If-- well, I wish you could see them. It’s very pretty.”

Tony knew well enough why Bucky couldn’t take him to see them; none of them were certain how the other drow would react to a human in their midst. Since his visit was to be so short, they’d agreed it would be for the best if he stayed in their home-cave, out of sight. “It sounds lovely,” he agreed. “Thank you,” he added, smiling in return. “This is very generous.”

“You should at least let me cook you _one_ ,” Bucky teased, selecting another one from the basket. “You’ve never had it. I will make a very small pie with it. Tiny. Only a few bites apiece. Yes?”

Tony had no idea at all what might happen if he ate one. Maybe nothing -- maybe the magical properties were nullified by being cooked. Or maybe he would start to glow like the mushroom’s bright spots. Or... who knew? “...All right,” he said tentatively, nervous but unable to resist Bucky’s eagerness. “I’ll try it.”

“It is good, you will see,” Bucky said. He left the basket on the table in Tony’s little cave -- he had been told that once that was Bucky’s room when Bucky was a child, but when their Father had passed on, Natasha had taken his room, and then Bucky had resisted for almost a year before deciding he wanted the room that adjoined a small bathing room, leaving Bucky’s old room mostly for storage, until they’d needed it. He hesitated a moment before taking Tony’s hand -- it was the first time Tony had heard the myth that humans were _poisonous_ in a very literal sort of way. But they’d discovered they could, in fact, touch each other without harm to either party. Bucky still sometimes acted like it was a thing of great bravery that he was doing.

Tony smiled at him and squeezed Bucky’s hand a little. “What is it?”

“Did-- did you feel that?” Bucky frowned, let the mushroom fall onto the table. It sat there a moment, then rolled. First one way, and then the other. Tony could feel--

The ground.

Moving under them.

Bucky said something in his own language that sounded harsh, like a word that had grown teeth. He crouched, touching his fingers to the floor as if somehow sensing, gathering information from the very rock under their feet.

“Is it an earthquake?” Tony’s heart sped up. Earthquakes were dangerous above ground; in the caverns like this, it would be a nightmare.

“Worse,” Bucky said. He pulled Tony in closer, as if he might be able to protect him. “Magma-kin. A spirit of rock and fire. They are ancient, these caves were once theirs. They-- the old ones are dead and _gone_. But sometimes, one of the young ones, they _wake up_.”

“What can we do?” Tony was, at heart, a fixer, a solver of problems. He immediately began cataloging all the items in the home-cave, all the artifacts and tools he’d been carrying when he fell.

“There is no time,” Bucky said. He led the way to another cave in their small system, pulling out beautiful things from a trunk; a glowing sword, a few pieces of armor. “Here, take this--” He handed Tony a necklace with a single, blue stone hanging from it. “It will keep the air pure around you-- otherwise you might suffocate on the sulphur clouds. I-- I cannot take you to the crevice, there’s not enough time. I’m so sorry.”

Tony pulled the necklace over his head. “Don’t worry about me,” he said. “What about you, how are you going to breathe?” The stone nestled against his breastbone, and Tony almost immediately felt like the air he was breathing had improved, just a little.

“Natasha will share her air with me,” Bucky said. “We are of the same clan, and she will be with the priests. Help me, do you know--” He started putting on the pieces of armor, a gauntlet, vambrace, pauldron. “We don’t have the whole suit, not anymore, but this will help protect me.”

Somewhere in the distance, Tony heard the most horrific roar, like a thousand lions screamed defiance all at once.

“Widow protect us, it’s on this side of the lake,” Bucky said, his face pale with fear. “There’s only us, Tony--”

“Well, then we’ll have to be good,” Tony said. His own fear was like a sick dizzy pressure in his chest, but he pushed it down. He could panic afterward. If he survived.

He glanced around again and snatched up the brightcap that Bucky had dropped. “Ten breaths,” he said. He didn’t have time for delicate spellwork, and under normal circumstances, he’d be aghast at using an entire mushroom for one spell, but he was never going to cast another spell again if they didn’t survive this. He crushed the mushroom in his fist, squeezing out every bit of its liquid that he could manage, and breathed his magic into it, through it, infusing it with power. He looked up and drew a quick rune on Bucky’s forehead with the dark, glowing juice, almost like ink. “Protection,” he promised. “It should last--” He did a few rapid calculations, a rough estimate at best. “--half an hour, at least. Wait here.” He dashed for his room and snatched up his satchel. He had to have _something_ that would be useful. He’d figure it out on the way.

“It is vulnerable to cold, to water,” Bucky said. He finished attaching the armor and muttered a word over it. The ancient metal seemed to sink into his skin, becoming a part of him, glinting and beautiful, flexible and precise, and yet impenetrable. “Can you use a sword?”

“If I must,” Tony said. “I’m better with magic. Keep the sword for yourself.”

“They don’t much like cold, and they’re damaged by water. It’s hard to get them wet, though,” Bucky instructed. “They’re so hot, it just steams off and they cook you to death. Best to try to get to the shore. It’s too far to swim, but Natasha will try to send one of the boats for us. Dive under the water if you get in trouble. It won’t follow you.”

Tony had images of being boiled alive in the lake. “I’ll be careful,” he promised. “You too.”

Bucky gave him a quick smile, which was _not at all_ a promise to be careful, Tony would have liked to have noted, except there was another roar, and he probably didn’t have time to yell at Bucky about technicalities. 

“Let’s go,” Bucky said. “If it comes down this way, we won’t have a prayer. We need space to get around it.”

“Right.” Tony patted at his pouches, checking that he had all his things -- for whatever good they’d do -- and followed Bucky out into the caverns.

“I am sorry about this,” Bucky said. “We should have worked harder to get you home. This is not your war.” 

The caves were not pitch black the way they normally were to Tony, instead somewhat smoky yellow, like there was a big fire somewhere in the distance. The air stung at his eyes, but Tony could breathe all right. Bucky pulled his collar up over his nose. 

The air was warm, and then very warm, and then _much too warm_ as they made their way toward the lake. Tony was dripping with sweat and at the same time, his hair felt like it was getting singed.

“The granaries are burning,” Bucky said, tipping his head. Very faintly, Tony could hear the sounds like a million tiny explosions.

“That sounds... bad,” Tony murmured. The drow didn’t have much grain; it was hard to come by, gathered mostly by raiding the surface. They probably wouldn’t starve without it, but things wouldn’t be comfortable, either. “You’d think we’d be able to see it by now.”

“I don’t want to see it,” Bucky complained. “I could live my whole life without--”

Except that he was not going to get to live his whole life without seeing it, because there it was. Black as coal, man-shaped, only in that it had two arms, a head, and looked somewhat _melted_ , with two blazing marks across its chest that they didn’t notice until it turned around. Narrow, glowing eyes observed them, and it reached-- Tony could _feel it_ , reaching into the etherrealm to pull out two vivid, molten lava whips. One cracked, setting the stone around it on fire.

“That is _entirely_ unnecessary,” Tony complained. His mind raced, running down the items he had with him and what they could do. “Split up?”

“Right,” Bucky said. “You go for the lake, I’ll go around the other side.” _He can only kill one of us at a time._ Bucky didn’t actually say that, Tony was just projecting. _Probably_.

The creature didn’t seem particularly mobile; no legs. Just a molten slag that burned its way in the direction it wanted to go.

Tony couldn’t help noticing that Bucky had sent him toward the lake, which was probably the safest place to be.

And the most dangerous place for the elemental. “Hey ugly!” Tony shouted, waving his arms. “Come and get me!”

“Staaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrk,” the creature yelled back, waving its arms to mock him. Or imitate him. Or-- wait, did that thing just _say his name_?

Surely it couldn’t actually _know_ him... Tony watched it carefully, dancing out of reach of those whips. “Come on!” he taunted, “You look familiar; have I met your mother?”

It smiled at him, a dripping, oozing smile, with a mouthful of shiny, unidentifiable metal teeth. “Theeeeef,” it moaned at him. “Traitor. Hooooward Staark.” It lashed at him, again and again, burning little ruts in the cave floor that slowly filled with pooling lava.

Son of a bitch, Howard, Tony thought viciously, jogging backward as fast as he dared for the dubious safety of the lake. What did you do _now?_

“Buddy, I’m not Howard,” he pointed out. “Whatever he stole from you, that’s on him.”

“Staaarks lie,” the creature complained. “Staaarks steal….” Another slash, a surge forward. It was slow. But the ground was uneven enough that it was gaining on him.

He chanced a glance behind him; there was a fat warboat on the lake, a spot of blackness in the silvery surface. Gods only knew what the drow were up to, but it probably wasn’t good for _Tony_.

When Tony jerked back around, there was a shadow behind the creature, a shadow with a glinting sword and only a bit of skin visible around the cowl covering his hair.

Shit, no, Bucky, just stay in the shadows! Tony wanted to yell. He could lure it toward the water, let the drow in their warboat do... whatever they had planned. If Bucky attacked now and the thing turned back...

“What the hell could we have stolen from you?” Tony wondered, trying to keep the creature’s attention on him. “A rock?”

The monster thumped its own chest, knocking bits of ash and molten rock to the ground that somehow seemed still animated. In fact, it rolled over to the monster and _climbed back on_ like tiny soot sprites. That was creepy and gross. 

“Arc-key…” the creature moaned. “Give it back-- the key, the arc-key…” It was becoming more human by the second, and that wasn’t the least bit terrifying either, until it finished shaping itself. Tall, broad shouldered, long, ragged hair that was the color of smoke. _Covered_ in tattoos. “Tony Stark.”

The _arc-key_? What the hell would a magma elemental want with that? It was just a rock, really, albeit a nicely shiny one, pulsing with magical power. If Howard had stolen it from this thing -- or anyone else -- Tony didn’t know about it. Which didn’t mean Howard _hadn’t_ stolen it; Tony wouldn’t put it past the man.

But then Howard had given it to Tony to use in his creations, and Tony had put it in a ring. The ring that Bucky was still wearing, as a matter of fact, and he had to fight hard with himself to avoid looking past the person-looking elemental at Bucky. “The arc key?” Tony shook his head. “No idea what you’re talking about. Might be in one of Howard’s safes, topside.”

The whip lashed out again, and Tony only barely managed to miss getting small but vital parts of him sheared off.

Bucky moved again, another step or two, and the shadow of him on the wall, wobbly and confusing anyway because it was being cast by a living magma elemental who took up a hobby as masquerading as a human sometimes, went -- strange.

Round and blobby from the hips down, and waaay, way too many legs. Bucky shot up a good six feet, taller than the magmakin, sword angled just right.

What the _fuck--_ Tony wasn’t able to avoid staring at the-- whatever Bucky had turned into. “What in the gods’ names is that?”

The magma-kin turned around to look, which was like falling for the dumbest trick in the book. Probably why Tony was completely out of position to take advantage of it. Bucky stabbed down, slicing one of the creature’s arms completely off.

It shrieked with unholy rage, the whip falling to the floor and flailing like a snake with its head cut off. It struck at Bucky several times with the other whip. Bucky caught it with his armored hand, and then _shrieked_ , the spidery-blob that was his lower body giving out as if all the knees had unlocked at the same time.

“Bucky!” Tony groped in his bag for something -- anything of use.

A flask of neverending water. A spark of an idea lit in Tony’s brain and he pulled out a brightcap, breaking it into pieces and stuffing them into the flask’s mouth, muttering an incantation as he worked. He felt feverish, dizzy, and had no idea if that was the elemental’s fumes or the heat it was still putting out despite its mostly-human shape or simply his own fear for his friend.

The magma-kin was winding up for another strike with that whip. Tony had no idea what would happen to Bucky if the spider-y half of his body was sliced in half, but it almost certainly wouldn’t be good.

He cast a tiny illusion on the flask’s stopper as he jammed it back into the bottle. “Hey, ugly! You want your arc-key? Here it is!” He wound up and threw the bottle into the air.

The elemental whirled back in the other direction, holding out its remaining hand. The severed arm was doing its best to crawl back to its owner, flopping around blindly like a fish. Ug, _gross_. No wonder these things were hard to kill.

The flask landed in the elemental’s palm and it raised the flask toward its face to inspect it.

Tony broke the last little piece of the brightcap that he had in his hands, a sympathetic magic that pulled the stopper from the bottle. A huge gush of water splashed into the magma-kin’s face... and kept pouring.

The magma-kin screamed like a thousand boiling teakettles, filling the cavern with steam. Bucky skittered up to him, still huge and half spidery and holding his wounded arm against his chest. “Come on, come on,” he urged, pulling Tony further toward the lake.

Tony let Bucky all but carry him; those long, spider-like legs could move a hell of a lot faster than Tony could anyway. “What is this?” he demanded.

“What’s what?” Bucky got them all the way to the lake and then, wincing, crawled out into the water. “Ug, that’s cold.”

“ _This!_ ” Tony said, waving at the lower half of Bucky’s body.

“Oh,” Bucky said. “Um, that’s… it’s called a drider. I guess, I’m called a drider, really. The Black Widow Goddess can give it to one of the clan, in times of dire need. Or if she’s really mad at you. It’s sometimes hard to tell the difference.”

“Is it permanent?”

“If it was the life-saving, keep the clan from dying out, last resort, no,” Bucky hedged. He waved his hand in front of his face, trying to clear the mist. “Did you kill it?”

Tony peered in the direction of the magma-kin, but it was hard to see through all the mist. “Maybe? I don’t hear it yelling anymore.”

“I have a bad feeling about sneaking up to have a look,” Bucky hedged, “but a worse feeling about finding out it’s not actually dead and we left it there to get better.”

“I feel like we did all the work,” Tony pointed out, “and someone else should go make sure it’s actually dead.”

“It was very impressive. I was very impressed. What did you do to it?” Bucky shifted deeper into the water, letting Tony hang on around his waist while he soaked his left arm in the cold. “I think it might have seared my arm. I really don’t want to look at that, so distract me.”

“Flask of neverending water,” Tony said. “Usually the water only comes out when you pour from it, but I enchanted some pieces of brightcap to expand sort of... explosively, so they’d push the water out. Don’t look, but I’m going to check on your arm, okay?” He climbed around Bucky to examine the injured arm.

“Yeah, it doesn’t hurt right now, a lot, because of the drider thing,” Bucky said, “but I can feel it, just sort of… waiting to hurt. Does that even make sense?”

It did, in a horrible way, because when Tony looked at the arm, there wasn’t much of it left; mostly burned and melted, with bits of charred bone.

“Ah... Yes.” Tony paused for a moment to swallow down the urge to throw up. “That’s going to be pretty painful once the excitement starts to die down, I expect.” Could priests heal wounds this bad? Could they regrow entire arms? He’d never heard of that happening before, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t happen. Spiders could regrow lost legs, couldn’t they?

Wait, maybe that was lizards.

“Well, you’re not dead, and I’m not dead, and that thing hasn’t come stumbling out of the mist to kill us yet,” Bucky pointed out. “So-- maybe everything will be all right.”

“Yes, I’m sure everything will be fine,” Tony agreed, tacking on a mental _eventually_. He took another look at the remains of Bucky’s arm. He’d never tried to artifice a limb before. That would be an interesting challenge.

Which was, of course, the perfect time for the drow forward navy to show up, Natasha in the lead.

There were suddenly an awful lot of magical weapons around, and Natasha, who was always just a little bit frightening, was terrifying clad all in her priestess garb. She dispatched a unit to go ‘take care’ of the rest of the problem before stalking over to them.

“Get out here right now,” she snapped.

“Do you think she means both of us?” Tony murmured.

“Do you really think you should make me face her alone?” Bucky muttered back, making some effort to drag his huge spidery backside out of the water. 

“We have a small problem,” Natasha started, hands on her hips. “As in we never told anyone you were here, and now you are very obviously here, and-- it’s a problem.”

“We did save everyone from the rampaging magma elemental,” Tony pointed out. “I feel like that should count in our favor.”

“And a poisonous viper has been known to kill a rampaging bear but that doesn’t mean I should take the snake home with me,” Natasha spluttered.

“I think she just compared you to a snake,” Bucky said, helpfully.

“I caught that, thanks,” Tony said. “What, uh, exactly is the problem? I mean, in practical terms? You’re not allowed to have guests?”

“You are a human! You’re… like an insane ferret with rabies! You’re not supposed to be here,” Natasha said. “And--” Her gaze drifted upward. “And apparently you’re casting spells on my brother _without my permission_.”

Bucky reached up to touch the rune. “Oh…”

“...shit.” Tony hadn’t even thought about that in the moment of crisis. “It was protective!” he tried. “I think I did okay!” Behind them, a loud rumble and hiss sounded as the clean-up team knocked the magma-kin apart and tried to re-stopper the neverending flask.

Natasha, on the other hand, smiled, looking indescribably pleased. “There are two solutions to the problem, then. And you get to pick, aren’t you lucky?”

“Natasha, no,” Bucky said, but there was something strained and strange and somehow longing in that tone.

“Natasha, yes.” She turned to glare daggers in Tony’s direction. “Either you have broken the most sacred of the drow law and will probably be tried and executed--”

“ _Natasha_!” Bucky protested.

“Shut up, brother.”

“I have to say, the choice is looking pretty simple so far,” Tony said drily. “What’s the other option?”

“You join the clan,” Natasha said. “You become one of us.”

“All jokes aside,” Bucky said, practically talking to Tony’s shoulder, “when I asked you if we could keep him, I didn’t-- it should be his choice.”

“You picked up an adorable monster and brought it home,” Natasha said. “It’s only suitable that you take care of it.”

Tony glanced between them. “So when you say _join the clan_ , you mean...”

“You are a little old to be adopted,” Natasha said. “But there are other ways. You can marry in to the clan.”

“I do not think I am emotionally prepared to be the groom at a _literal_ sword-point wedding,” Bucky muttered. “So unfair.”

“Huh.” Tony considered it. “It would solve a couple of other problems as well,” he pointed out.

“Like what?” Bucky was _sulking_. That was interesting.

“Well, for one, if you have a human in the clan, it’s a lot easier for you to do things like, say, trade with humans. For another, well, I’d been sort of feverishly trying to come up with an excuse not to go back.”

“You want to stay?” Bucky looked up, finally. 

“It’s not like I’m offering him no choice,” Natasha said. “He does not have to marry _you_. We are a clan of two, after all. Maybe Tony likes me better.”

Tony was pretty sure she was kidding. He hoped she was kidding. He turned wide eyes on Bucky and whispered, “Save me.”

“If you insist,” Bucky said, trying not to smile and failing. “I-- I do like you, you know.”

“I like you too. I want to stay.” Tony paused. “But if you’re stuck like that, we’re going to need to have a long talk about your expectations for the wedding night.”


End file.
